


A Wider World; or, The Felicitous Effect of Hamilton on Reluctant Superheroes

by lionsmay



Category: Captain America (Movies), Hamilton - Miranda, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Broadway, Bucky Barnes Feels, Feelings, Feels, Gen, M/M, Musicals, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Steve Rogers Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-08
Updated: 2016-07-08
Packaged: 2018-07-22 06:27:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7423648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lionsmay/pseuds/lionsmay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before heading to Wakanda, Steve takes a reluctant Bucky on a surprise road trip to see Hamilton. The power of Hamilton breaks down Bucky's defences and helps him feel again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Wider World; or, The Felicitous Effect of Hamilton on Reluctant Superheroes

Steve had made him promise not to look. Bucky wouldn't agree to being blindfolded (to relinquish that much control, even to Steve, was something he could no longer do), but he had agreed to close his eyes. Little good that did him. All his senses were sharp, and he could tell by the sounds and, yes, smells, that they were in Manhattan. Midtown, if he had to be specific.

The question now was why. He and Steve had been laying low since their final fight in Siberia and their little high-seas jailbreak. It had been just one small town after the other, never staying long. Killing time, really, until Bucky was ready to take the T’Challa up on his offer. At least, that’s what he knew Steve hoped.

But now they were here, in New York city. The scene of so many of The Avengers so-called-crimes, and the home of his and Steve’s past. Bucky assumed Steve brought him here for the latter reason, some trip down memory lane.

As the sounds of the city intensified, he racked his brains (well, racked them more than they had already been racked), trying to remember the significant moments the two of them had shared in this part of town. Had there been a bar? A fight? A girl? It was all so hard to hold onto sometimes. The past came to him in jolts and flashes and disappeared just as fast. And if he tried too hard to find a particular memory, chances were something else would leap out at him. Something dark and sick and bloody and — _no._

Bucky squeezed his eyes even tighter and shook his head. He wasn’t going to go there. He didn’t have to try and figure out where he was. What mattered is that he was with Steve. He’d let Steve have his surprise. He didn’t need to be on guard with him. He was safe.

Eventually the car they were in stopped moving for good and Bucky felt it lurch into park. He heard Steve get out of the driver’s side and shut the door (always just a little too hard; his friend still hadn’t quite gotten used to his own strength). In a moment, Bucky felt Steve’s arms on his shoulders as he eased him out of the car.

“Am I opening my eyes now?” he asked patiently.

“Notyetnotyetnotyet,” Steve muttered excitingly.

He steered Bucky down the street for what felt like forever. Blocks and blocks at least. Bucky tensed again. He didn’t like this. Two wanted, well-known men, one of them with his defences down, in the middle of (what sounded like) an extremely crowded Manhattan street. No, he didn’t like it one bit.

“Steve …” Bucky said warningly.

“Okay, okay — open your eyes!”

Bucky found himself standing across the street from … a theatre? The building itself wasn't familiar to him, but again, his memory wasn’t what it used to be. His training kicked in and Bucky combed the area for clues as to why his friend had brought him here. There was a swarm of people outside, all looking varying degrees of nervy and gleeful, the cameras on their phones perpetually flashing. Bucky looked up. Above the door was an enormous brownish poster of he silhouette of a man standing on top of what looked like a star. A name was printed block capitals across the bottom. The name was familiar to him, but he couldn't imagine what this had to do with him and Steve. He considered the star again.

“Is this … is this an Avengers thing? Didn’t we just …?”

“No, no, it isn't an Avengers thing. Buck, it’s _Hamilton_!" Steve’s eyes were wide and expectant and a boyish grin lit up his face.

“The ten dollar bill guy?”

“Yes! It’s a _show_ , but it’s so much more than a show… “ Steve launched into an lengthy, almost-giddy explanation. It was a musical. About the creation of America. With hip-hop. Bucky wasn't sure what he was expecting at the end of this mystery road trip, but it certainly wasn't that. His bewilderment must have been evident on his face.

Steve tried again. “It’s a hit! Everyone’s loves it! I just, I thought, before you go, well, to sleep for a bit, you’d want to be part of something that’s … now. Something nice.”

“Something now and something nice,” Bucky repeated flatly. “So you decided to take me to see a song-and-dance show about men who died. Two hundred years ago.”

“Yes! I mean, no, listen, Buck. This is huge right now! It’s the hottest ticket in town. People are crazy for it. I don’t even know how I got tickets, exactly. But here we are.”

Bucky sighed. “Revolution, war — it isn't a game, Steve. It isn’t acting. You of all people should know that.”

Bucky couldn’t bring himself to feel excited or pleased. If he had been able to feel anything it would have been revulsion. The idea of seeing a bunch of grown men dress up in costume to sing and dance, bloodless and whole up on that stage. He almost got a sense of it, that disgust. It wasn't that he felt it, not exactly. It was more like he saw it inside his head; it was a funhouse reflection of a feeling, fractured and filtered, and trapped just out of reach.

But Steve … well, Steve was here and he had just finished saying something about “civic pride” and “a national community” and he was looking at Bucky. Intently. With those eyes. Those eyes were the only thing that really remained from the skinny kid he’d once been. The rest of him might be Captain America, the once hero and now villain of the American people, but the eyes? The eyes were pure Steve Rogers. The eyes belonged to those who really loved him, who really knew him.

“Okay, okay. You sure this is safe, though? ‘Theatre’ generally means crowded room with few exits. How do you think we’re going to get in and out of there without being recognized?”

But Steve had thought of everything. “With this,” he replied. For the first time Bucky noticed the plastic bag dangling from Steve's wrist. He subtly opened the bag and Bucky glimpsed a jumble of clothing and … hair? “They’re disguises. Nat got them for me. She said aviators and ball caps weren’t going to cut it this time. She knows a great wig guy.” Steve frowned. “Well, she knows a discrete wig guy. Anyway, let’s head back to the car. We’ve got to get ready before the curtain goes up.”

Bucky was fairly certain he was going to regret the next three hours, but he followed his friend anyway.

**********

The matter of how Steve had got the tickets was less mysterious than he had let on.

When word of T’Challa’s offer to keep Bucky safe had reached them, Bucky seemed prepared to accept it, but there was something not quite committed about his tone. Bucky had said yes the way people sometimes said yes to invitations from casual acquaintances to catch up over a cup of coffee or a beer, invitations Steve came to realize they never intended to keep. It made Steve nervous. He didn't want Bucky to do anything rash. And unlike everyone else, he knew that now, hidden away from those that wanted to use him and control him, the biggest threat Bucky posed was to himself.

But Bucky had said he agreed, and so they made their way back from the Midwest in a series of stolen cars (stolen but well-treated; Steve insisted on leaving gas money plus a little extra for mileage in the glove compartment. He was learning from his mistakes). On the side of some dusty road one day, Steve had shared his concerns about Bucky to Nat.

“I just wish there was something I could do for him,” he had said, finding it easier to speak his mind into phone than to Nat herself, “Something fun that would make him feel connected to this time and place. Something that might remind him what we’re fighting for. They way you all did for me.”

The next time they spoke, Nat said she was forwarding him an email. When Steve finally opened the attachment he could barely believe it.

“Don’t thank me, I’m just the messenger,” Nat had quipped drily.

Steve still wasn’t really up on his pop culture, but this show had even made the regular news. The tickets were selling for hundreds of dollars a piece and still almost impossible to get. Steve guessed immediately who had the ready cash and connections to get them a seat on such short notice. It touched him to think that despite all their differences and everything that happened in Siberia, Tony would still pull strings for him. Even when it involved Bucky.

The gift itself, though, didn’t seem quite Tony’s style. Tony could be generous —lavishly so— and he was happy to use his influence for his friends, but he wasn't thoughtful. This gift that united the past and the present, and that told the story of men who believed so strongly in ideals of freedom and self-determination? This gift was more that thoughtful. It was _perfect_. There was only one person close to Tony who could always be relied on to be this thoughtful and to pick the perfect gift. Steve wasn’t sure if this meant Pepper and Tony had patched things up, but it meant they were talking at least. It meant Tony had someone he could confide in. That still mattered to Steve.

As he watched _Hamilton_ Steve thought of his friends. He thought of the gang holed up in the Avengers compound in better days when they too had indulged in winking, raucous camaraderie. He thought of the friend beside him he desperately hoped to reach. When Angelica lit up the stage, he thought of the commanding, brave, impossibly intelligent woman he had loved and lost. And of course, he thought of the friend who had got him there. After all, the whole show centred around a polarizing, incessantly verbalizing genius, a man whose mind (and mouth) never stopped working. All that  _and_ the goatee? If Tony had seen _Hamilton_ , there was no doubt he saw himself in its star. Steve did too, and he couldn't keep himself from smiling.

**********

Only one number into the damn thing and Bucky knew he had been right: this was a mistake. He felt just too exposed and too conspicuous, even in their ridiculous “disguises” (him in a short white-blond wig, Steve in a pair of thick black glasses, and both of them wearing ties that once upon a time Bucky would have labelled “square”). Add to that a dark, crowded, noisy room? Bucky couldn't relax. He spent most of the time flinching at every second noise. His old reflexes were hard to master.

To distract himself he did what he always did: he scanned his environment. He looked around at the crowd. He may have been distracted from whatever was going on onstage, but they looked … transported. Reverent, even. One woman was crying thick tears that left trails of black down her cheeks, even as she beamed a smile. A couple was holding hands, their knuckles pale with the strain. A man a few rows down to the left of him was leaning forward in his seat, almost against his will, as if some force were pulling him closer to the stage. A teenage girl clasped her hands to chest, looking for all the world like she was a heartbeat away from fainting in her seat.

Steve was in second heaven, that much was clear. A delighted smile spread across his face at the jokes and his crystal eyes widened during all the emotional scenes. Bucky could even tell when he caught a reference to some song or another —Steve was very into “playlists” lately, he’d learned — because his eyebrows shot up and he nodded emphatically to himself.

As for Bucky? He felt nothing.

At least that wisp of revulsion had died. He had thought this show would make a mockery of war, but it didn’t. It was honest about the thrill and the cost. Bucky respected that. And the music was pretty good, too, especially considering how fast they were singing. Bucky felt like he wasn't processing each individual word but his rusty brain was still taking it all somehow in heaps. He understood everything. But he didn't feel anything. It didn't mean anything.

He kept telling himself that — _it doesn't mean anything_ — even when a particular line caught on one of the jagged places in his mind. “Dying is easy, young man. Living is harder.”

_Dying is easy. Living is harder._

Wasn’t that the crux of why he had been dragging his feet all the way back here? Wasn’t that why, deep-down, he hesitated to accept T’Challa’s offer?

Going to sleep meant waking up. Once everything had blown over, he’d have to come back. It was a temporary reprieve. Everything he battled, all the bloody darkness and hideous memory that lurked and prowled in the corners of his mind, it would all still be there waiting for him. Even if they figured out a way to turn his training off, no one could erase the past. When he woke up, he would have to start not just being alive in the world, but really living in it. That, he knew, would be excruciating.

Bucky toyed briefly with the idea of simply showing himself. Let whoever it was that saw him first lock him away. He didn't want to hurt anyone anymore, but he didn't much want to hurt himself either and he couldn't see his way out of that while he still drew breath. Sometimes he even thought it would be so much easier if someone would just …

Two things stopped Bucky from following this train of thought: the fear that whoever it was that caught him wouldn't lock him away or take him out, but would try to use him instead, and — maybe even more frightening — the fear that Steve would get hurt.

_Dying is easy. Living is harder._

It always came down to Steve. He couldn't give himself up and risk Steve getting hurt in the process of trying to save him (again). But he couldn't go on living like this. He’d like to say he couldn't live with himself if he never really faced the past, but the truth was probably could have. He could live silently and privately, never speaking too much or thinking too hard. He could keep his head down. He could keep swatting away the faces of everyone he’d killed, the ugly knowledge of what his body — what he — had done. It would be a flat, lonely existence, but he could do it.

No, the person he couldn't live with was Steve. He couldn’t keep living with his friend’s hopeful eyes, his gentle questions, and his damned unshakeable faith. He knew didn't deserve it, but he didn't want to feel the hurt he’d have to feel to deserve it. He didn't want to have to accept what he’d done — to really feel it and maybe to start trying to make amends. But he knew he couldn't keep facing Steve if he didn’t. Sooner or later he was going to have to do the right thing.

The raw electricity of the music washed over Bucky, tugging him along the current of the story. As he lost himself in it, the parts of his mind devoted solely to guarding himself began to buckle and slip away. Suddenly a memory surfaced, and for once it was a happy one. It was one of many hot, sticky summer Sundays he had spent down at the local movie house in Brooklyn with Steve.

Bucky never cared for the pictures too much either way, but the cinemas were cool and dark and the girls up on the screen always had great gams. Steve, though, had loved them. This one in particular he had eaten right up: soldiers and their best gals, all singing and dancing and vowing to do right by the stars and stripes. The songs they sang were about a community united against evil, and of a people willing to sacrifice everything for what they thought was right. Life wasn’t really like that, Bucky knew — divisions always ran deep and history tended to gloss over a lot of ugliness— but it must have felt like truth to Steve.

Now Bucky understood what it had meant to him. Now playing out before his eyes was the story of men and women who had made something from nothing but intention, will, and indomitable hope. Men and women who not only imagined but worked for a wider world. It was also the story of the one man who didn’t. A man with the potential for greatness who instead allowed fear and hesitation to rule him. A man who realized too late that the world could have held more.

As the music built to a tragic, tremulous crescendo, questions swarmed Bucky’s always-unsteady mind. _Was_ the world wide enough? Could it hold a place for him that wasn't as death's right hand? And even if it did, was he? Did he contain the magnitudes required to make himself a new man? Yes, it would be hard. But _he_ was hard. He had been made hard. Who was he to shy away from pain and work now?

History would recall Burr as a villain, and maybe rightly so, but this show had made him something more: it made him a man. Bucky knew he would never be anyone’s idea of a hero, but for the first time he thought that maybe he could still be human.

There in that darkened theatre, among all those people, in that stupid wig, with his legs cramped slightly under the seat, something shifted in Bucky. Something got knocked loose. It was like he had had a stone pressed against his chest for so long he had stopped even noticing it, and now it had been rolled away all at once. In the absence of that stone there was a lightness, a vacuum, and then suddenly, an aching rushed in to fill it — a mingling of guilt and sorrow and gratitude and, oh, most painful of all, hope.

By the end of the final number, the muffled sounds of sobs and murmurs around him erupted into an ecstatic cheer. It was the kind of cheer that was more inhale than exhale, a grasping at something vital. Bucky’s face was wet with tears.

As the lights came up (and he hurriedly wiped his eyes), Bucky could feel Steve tense beside him. His friend turned toward him, slow and almost tentative, as if for once he was the one holding himself in check.

“Did you like it?” Steve asked casually, but he couldn't keep the hope out of those damned Rogers eyes.

“Yeah. Yeah, I Iiked it. It was … perfect.” He felt his throat go thick as he looked at his friend’s face. “Thank you.”

Steve reached out to squeeze his shoulder and said simply, “I’m glad.”

“Steve, I-I’m ready. Take me to Wakanda. I don’t want to hurt anyone anymore. And I don’t want anyone to take me away. I want to be better. And whenever you guys figure out how to get this stuff out of my head, I’ll be ready.”

“Ready?”

"To … to really deal with all of this. All I’ve done. And to start being someone different.” He felt the heat rising in his cheeks. He was already embarrassed by what he was about to say. “I just … if someone ever tells my story, I don’t want it to be this. Or at least, I don't want this to be where it ends.”

Steve nodded, and Bucky could see his eyes shining. _Don’t you dare cry,_ he mentally commanded his friend. Steve must have heard him, because he turned his head away. When he turned back, a grin crossed his face again and his eyes were dancing.

“Let’s go.”


End file.
